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Interesting experience. About 6 years ago I was seeing my home teaching families regularly. This was over a period of years. Some were inactive, others were active. We left the Ward for 2 or 3 years and attended elsewhere. Came back, and I keep hearing from these people over and over and over again what a good home teacher I was. One of them kept asking me for a blessing because she believed she experienced a miracle after I did it once many years ago. I actually kind of avoided it and eventually said “from a Jack Mormon like me??”. She is now active (was inactive at the time), and is not a high profile leader in the Ward. She said she was a Jack Mormon once and welcomes blessings from fellow Jack Mormons.
Anyway, I eventually agreed to go back and give the blessing to this lady. She continued to tell me how much she liked having me over as a home teacher all those years. What was supposed to be an in and out blessing took 2.5 hours as we talked and reminisced. And the spirit was present when I gave it.
At the end she said “I respect the fact you hold the priesthood, that’s what matters”….as if to say, I don’t care if you consider yourself out of full fellowship, you have the priesthood and I believe in its power.
I guess when home teaching works, it does change lives, or at least, create good memories. So many times it doesn’t work at all.
This was the first healing blessing I’ve given in years and years. Strange how God blesses you even when you aren’t fully on the wagon.
I know men who Home Teach regularly & they stick to the same script. Which is: – greet the family.
– give the lesson.
– out the door in 5 or 10 minutes max.
HT & VT who visit their families that way are missing out on a lot.
They could be making life long friendships. Relationships that are rich & rewarding for both parties involved.
What you described is what Home Teaching was designed to be. IMO.
Thanks.
My experience isn’t as dramatic as yours SD but it has similarities. Thirty odd tears ago I and another woman in my current stake lived in the same ward in another stake. I was her HT, we were both YSA. I was a good Hter in those days and sincerely tried to visit my families monthly and look out for their needs, often without a comp. I did help this sister move, and once I pulled her out of a ditch in the winter with my 4×4. Fast forward to a time when I haven’t home taught in several years. I run into this sister from time to time at stake events (we both have stake callings). She always greets me with “Hey, how’s the best home teacher ever?”
I agree with MM.
Minyan Man wrote:
What you described is what Home Teaching was designed to be. IMO.Thanks.
I think we need to reword your comment — I think it was MEANT to be that way, but it has not been DESIGNED to be that way. It’s designed to be a shot gun approach at checking the box of seeing your families.
If it was designed to be a close-knit friendship, I think there would be less of an emphasis on one-way service (the HT to the family), greater consideration for whether HT and families WANT that kind of relationship with so many other people.
DJ, liked your experience. I guess we’ll quote Ray — home teaching is great, except when it isn’t.
I had an unexpected HT visit once. Two of us went to visit a single sister. She was living with her Mother at the time. We gave the lesson & like we always do, asked if there was anything we could do for them. She said the sink in the kitchen was
plugged & they couldn’t use the disposal. I volunteered to get my tool kit from the truck & look at the drain.
It turned out to be an easy fix. (I am not Mr Fix it.) They couldn’t thank us enough. For a couple years after that, they would
say to us, “remember that time you came Home Teaching & fixed the sink?” I’m sure they forgot the message before we left the house.
But, a simple act of helping, lived on for a couple of years. For me it was an important message.
It is better to help than to tell a story.
I love the principle and pure meaning of Home and Visiting Teaching, even though I have been a mediocre Home Teacher (at best) over the years. I don’t love the institutionalized “program” it has become in too many cases, but I love the concept. A lady in our ward passed away last week. She is the only Mormon in her large, Catholic extended family. She has had the same Home Teaxher for a long time – a wonderful, humble man who helped her get to church every week she could attend. He has never held a highly visible calling.
She donated her body to use her organs, and her family doesn’t want a traditional funeral. Everyone who will be at the family memorial service will be Catholic, except her Home Teacher and the High Priest Group Leader.
The family asked her Home Teacher to conduct the service.
When it works, it works.
SD wrote – Quote:but it has not been DESIGNED to be that way. It’s designed to be a shot gun approach at checking the box of seeing your families.
That is why I applauded Elder Hollands talk on HT. Not that anyone remembers or subscribes to it. But a GC talk on improving methods for being a more effect HT/VT does exist. So keep at it your way SD. Love always wins.
Quote:Brethren, the appeal I am making tonight is for you to lift your vision of home teaching. Please, in newer, better ways see yourselves as emissaries of the Lord to His children. That means leaving behind the tradition of a frantic, law of Moses–like, end-of-the-month calendar in which you rush to give a scripted message from the Church magazines that the family has already read. We would hope, rather, that you will establish an era of genuine, gospel-oriented concern for the members, watching over and caring for each other, addressing spiritual and temporal needs in any way that helps.
Quote:Now, as for what “counts” as home teaching, every good thing you do “counts,” so report it all! Indeed, the report that matters most is how you have blessed and cared for those within your stewardship, which has virtually nothing to do with a specific calendar or a particular location. What matters is that you love your people and are fulfilling the commandment “to watch over the church always.”7
https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/10/emissaries-to-the-church?lang=eng ” class=”bbcode_url”> https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/10/emissaries-to-the-church?lang=eng
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